Fontaines D.C. – Romance
XL
Where do you go after you’ve made a debut like Dogrel?
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Like the Strokes and Television before them, Fontaines D.C. arrived fully formed, emerging at the decade’s end with an intoxicating meld of post-punk nerviness and Joycean poetry. They chased it with the similarly sculpted A Hero’s Death (2020) and even lodged a Grammy nomination, not letting lockdown slow their momentum. The prolific quintet shifted away from both Ireland and post-punk on 2022’s Skinty Fia; their commercial stature rose, but it wasn’t clear if Fontaines D.C. would ever match the potency of their debut.
Romance, their fourth album in five years, feels like a rebirth. From the cascading synth ripples that usher in the title track—a brooding slab of art-rock overture—it’s the sound of a once-underdog group recalibrating their sound to suit the arenas and amphitheaters they’ve increasingly been playing. These Irish lads, now based in London, seem miles away from the taut post-punk of their formative years as they veer into exhilarating trip-hop (“Starburster”), anthemic grunge-pop (“Here’s the Thing”), and orchestral grandeur (“In the Modern World”).
On curiously titled, synth-splattered ballads like “Bug,” “Horseness Is the Whatness,” and “Motorcycle Boy” (presumably named for the enigmatic hero of the 1983 film Rumble Fish), lead singer Grian Chatten ditches his sprechgesang and embraces a more melodic vocal style. He often sounds like an angstier Chris Martin, and though his pronunciation of “Cah-negie Hall” betrays his Dublin roots, the band’s fixation on their homeland has ebbed in favor of a more globalized strain of alienation: “In the modern world / I don’t feel anything,” he repeats on “In the Modern World.”
The LP is slicker and more studio-oriented than Fontaines’ previous work, but it doesn’t forfeit their peculiar intensity. I find it reminiscent, strangely, of Blur’s self-titled album—another mid-career reinvention that found its creators modernizing their sound and pivoting away from the regional phenomenon they helped spark. Appropriately, Blur collaborator James Ford produced Romance, whose panic attack-inspired first single, “Starburster,” particularly evokes Damon Albarn with its free-associative raps.
Though not every experiment lands—the ethereal “Sundowner” comes across like Slowdive-lite—Romance is thrilling in its willingness to subvert what you thought you knew about Fontaines D.C. With the poignant closer, “Favourite,” they even have one more trick up their sleeve: an airily straightforward pop tune, replete with backing harmonies.
“You been my favourite for a long time,” Chatten croons. The feeling is mutual, mate. – GRADE: A-
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